#SOL16: Art Collaboration 2

Live Brilliantly (R. Cohen & M.A. Reilly, 2016)

This is work that is part of a series I am creating that combines art Rob made during the last few weeks of his life with new work of mine. I promised Rob I would do this.

Mixed media (watercolor, newspaper, gesso, acrylic paint, notebook pages, rice paper)

#SOL16: Art Collaboration 1

Grief (R.Cohen & M.A. Reilly, 2016)

When Rob was in the palliative care center of the hospital a few weeks before he died, he began to apply watercolor washes over pages of writing he had done

One morning I brought paint and brushes with me to the palliative care center when I went to visit Rob. I arrived to find he was very, very anxious about coming off the high-flow oxygen machine. He was afraid he would be oxygen deprived. While we waited for one of the nurses to arrive with a tranquilizer, I suggested painting.


I find it helps me to relax.
Anything that helps.



I gave him a pallet of paints, a cup of water, some napkins and some brushes. He picked up a brush and I did as well and we spent the next 45 minutes just painting. The art making did relax him.

I promised him that morning that I would create a piece of art that combined his notebook pages with new work of mine. The first attempt at this is the work that tops this post, Grief. It incorporates two pages from Rob's notebooks that he worked on that morning.

I love you, Rob and I hope somehow you are seeing this, feeling the love.

#SOL16: Freedom Sunrise

Freedom Sunrise (Rob Cohen, 2016)

This is a watercolor painting Rob made while in the hospital. An art therapist visits twice a week and on one day, he painted this.

For the last week I have been looking at it and find each day I come to like it more and more.

When March is Scarcely Here

When March is Scarcely Here (M.A. Reilly, 2013)

          A Light exists in Spring

          Not present on the Year

          At any other period —

          When March is scarcely here

              - Emily Dickinson